Month: August 2011

I have White and it’s C3 Sicilian, but he plays it the same as his coach Paul (from last night) does, so I know I can lead him into still waters, where experience helps. Of course, once again I played ridiculous on my clock, after ..f6 spending 20 minutes deciding whether to the play the quiet Be2, or fxe Nxf6, Bd3 which would be even and up Isaac’s alley. Not much choice after all, and Fruit likes Black better. One thing I didn’t like about that line is that he can form a Qc7,Bd6 battery against my f4 pawn, plus his knight is good on f6, how much more do I need to give the boy?

Well, he sort of “castles into it”, but I blunder a pawn with my b5? push (I figured I should have played Na4 earlier, forcing his queen to c7) where I would say he spent two seconds on the reply, but that is only because it took that long for him to reach the piece. He spent less than 20 minutes on the game, which was disconcerting after having played so many slower players lately, yet oddly the time that he did spend was a big help to me.

Still, I like my position. Then…it gets crazy, Isaac-like crazy. Luckily, ..a5 was not played instead of his ..Bc5??, which would have immediately equalized for Black. Thank you very much, I play a5 instead.

He started to throw tactical spanner-wrenches at me, but I dodged and weaved as best I could. I don’t know how one could call this positional play. The position was 100% pure tactical.

Luckily, he resigned prematurely as I told him as soon as he had that he could have continued on with …QxB, QxQ bxR. We played out the scenario post-mortem where he advances his center pawns, but like I told him “It looks close, but I think White can hold” and I did.

The best thing to happen at the end was getting paid. 🙂 My rating temporarily shot up to 1831, but the Wednesday tournament will bring it down unless I win my last round there against someone high-rated like Mark (if he shows).

I played Paul tonight, with the Black pieces as expected. Paul grabbed the initiative and should have won, but I never got nervous the entire game. In the complications, I was able to see things quickly and he appeared to be getting nervous. I guess he didn’t go for one of the winning shots that he saw, instead of playing Rxb7, and I returned the favor at the end.

The game score is not accurate. Everything is the same in that final position except that my pawn is on g3, not g4, so I am winning, BUT I had 5 seconds left on my clock. I saw the winning ..g5, hxg g2, gxh g1(Q), and then he can play h7 or even check so that rook is covering the pawn on h7, I see now. I was concerned that if I don’t mate, and I really may have 4.1 seconds since you can never trust a digital clock when it says 5, and if I spend 4 seconds not on delay that I could lose. Really, the whole thing has to be played on delay, you cannot use that 4 seconds really. So, He says “3-fold repetition”, and I can tell he’s not keeping score, but instantly agree and shake his hand, a fitting conclusion. I’ve been burned too many times with a drawn game where I barely lost on time, so I know that 5 seconds is not 5 seconds. If you pause when looking to find the mate at all, you are toast. I suppose I should have played on though, but mostly wanted to avoid the loss.

Afterward he mumbles how I am getting all of his rating points. I remind him that it’s only about 7 points. I felt like a gentleman about it, never got nervous, and knew I had been very lucky, so it’s a sensible result. I was inwardly surprised how everyone, even those with a life, care so much about rating points. I seemed to take the game in stride more, didn’t feel like I deserved to win it, but he blitzed in my time-pressure with bad moves. Even in post-mortem he seemed to have the “everything wins” mindset, but I was able to draw him, pointing out he should have blocked my pawns rather than traded.

I feel like a pro because I play so much, even if my effort was weak by objective standards. It’s still not as much an exertion as trying to solve combos at home. So when I get to the board, I may see or not see, but it’s not an undue exertion. I should be spending more time and energy on complications though, so I have gotten a bit lazy and soft I guess. For me, it was an enjoyable game. I actually enjoyed the game and it didn’t phase me at all. Once I asked for a draw and he refused “too many tricks still left in the position”. Respectable answer, but it tells that he was trying too hard to “win” since he was blitzing in my time pressure whilst he still had 27 minutes remaining.

I feel like people aren’t respecting the game, chess, when they are trying to ‘play the man’ (i.e., my clock). I almost want to say “Slow down, play it right, stop sweating and just win the game.”

In these weekday tournaments, I am more satisfied with a draw. If this were a big money game I would have blitzed it out for a win or loss on time. For some reason, I sort of think we are all friends here, but people care deeply about their results. Mark doesn’t want to play (he showed up this month) because the tournament is not strong enough. He had to play a kid, but him, I, and Paul are the strongest rated.

My rating at this very moment is maybe 1807, but I feel that that is an accurate rating for me at G/90 or slower. I wanted to play the K.I.D. against him, but decided to play something which I knew better, because of his higher rating. A fun game, a lot of missed tactics.

Really, I played badly yet confidently in those middlegame complications. It’s funny, I think that he is a better player than me, but for some reason I can outblitz a lot of people in the endgame, and it comes as a great shock to them because I take so much time earlier in the game, and perhaps make some moronic moves, I guess, but it’s the best I know how at the time. I deserved to lose this game, Paul played some amazing chess, but I tried my best. This is why I am happy for the draw. It wouldn’t have seemed right had I won this game. Me and Mark both saw that he had Rb2, not giving up the g-pawn, but he actually moved the rook to b5, I take, then he takes my a-pawn, and he played this nervously, hurriedly, in my time-pressure. I guess the pressure he feels to win is so great that he must try and blitz a loss out of me, can’t think of another explanation for such an obvious oversight, and horrific blunder to go after the a-pawn on his part. This is why the game score is inaccurate, he actually wasted a tempo somehow moving his rook to b5, when he saw he was going to lose his g-pawn.

This opening is close to the draw, which was also my intention. I defended better than I realized. You can’t pay attention to the score. Such as when I played that ..Bd6 defensive move, that does seem best, ignore the initial scores. When White played Rxb7 RxR, QxRb7, I should have replied with ..Bxh2+, KxB Qxd6+ followed by QxBd3.

I missed a tactic of NxNe4, BxNe4 Qh4, f4(forced) Nxe3 winning a pawn. Naturally, I was only thinking strategy, not tactics. He played NxNf6 and I immediately recaptured with knight as soon as he finished his move, but I thought I had ..gxNf6, but that would have lost quickly.

Maybe this happens to everyone, but when he was playing quickly at the start, he seemed very composed. As he started using time, he got more nervous and composure seemed to slowly ebb away as the game went. I guess everyone’s brain gets boggled as they start to think a lot, and then nervousness. G/90 is too short for me to get tired and nervous lately. It’s just a short game to me, I could play another one back to back. Perhaps this is from weekend tournament stamina.

Move 13, Black should play ..c5, not ..b5? IMHO. You can see how brilliant that this kid is and why he is rated what he is rated, but it is tactics, not positional play. Positional play represents experience, and even the brightest kids may not have that part down nearly as much.

A good way to think of positional play is WHEN something is or is not tactically feasible. The kids can execute the tactics, it’s a matter of WHEN. If all there are is good, quiet moves, then they may find those because it’s a matter of elimination. So, don’t think that they can’t maneuver optimally, if they are high rated.

Instead of 17..Nc3+??, Black could defend with 17..Re8 and if 18.Qe4 then ..f5, and if 18.Rg1, then upon hxg6..QxQ, NxQ g6 and Black can try to scoop up the h6 pawn with the king or ignore it. I’m not even using an engine for this. Have to defend well and play positionally, though.

Here is a positional question that I just finished asking myself. Assuming White hadn’t blundered his queen and had played 20.QxQ instead, how can Black continue to play for a positional advantage? I’ll give my answer in the comment following this post:FICS game

Lastly, I have to thrown in this blitz game. I played an exchange sac, and it looks like a joke, at first, but I don’t see the refutation to my own attack. It was an inspired move and I got a strong attack for it. I think he’s got to play the zwischenzug move 27..Rf8. That one took me a long time to find.

Progress on ‘Combination Challenge’ 772 problems completed. Quite a few of these are “sack 3-5 pieces to find the forced checkmate”, and I don’t remember such problems on a tactics server that went like that. A tactics server seems to keep feeding you at your rating, which is measured by speed of board-vision. I still don’t have fast board-vision, except possibly in time-trouble. I also find these problems to be mentally fatiguing, so that I usually require a nap when done to clear my mind.

Takchess completed 70,000 problems on a server. I think BDK may have completed the 7 circles. But I can’t even google and find out anyone else who completed the 7 circles. A lot of people started on it, talked about it, complained about it, complained about difficulty of duplicating MDLM’s results, but where are the people who finished it. I would be surprised if it’s more than a handful, and that includes MDLM himself.

My take on studying both endgame and tactical positions is that many of them are either composed or something that the computer found out for them when they got home. In practical terms, I think it makes a person want to analyze endgames and tactics more critically OTB, recalling patterns as they analyze, giving them an edge in “messy” situations.

Let’s put it this way, does anyone who has done the seven circles, completed it, have a higher OTB rating that me? lol. It’s been out there for over 5 years now, we should have some results. Blunderprone is the only other active player/knight that I can point to besides myself. I see some have 2100 rating on chesstempo, so I don’t doubt that tactics makes you better at tactics.

Round 1
I won against a 1300 rated kid, who must be massively under-rated.

Thank goodness for first round seedings. I was missing simple tactics here.
17..RxN, 18.QxR Rf8, 19.Queen moves Bxf2+ followed by BxR.
18..Qh5, 19.d4 RxN, 20.gxR Qxh3+, 21.Ke2 Qxf3+. Somehow I was jumbling in my mind how the difference between how that tactic would be played out on this move and how it was on the previous move. I was seeing it ending up as ..Qg2 and Re2 defense. Don’t know how I was seeing that.

His 20.d4 was a blunder, but I recognized it as a good move in disguise. This kid plays a lot of rated fast chess, and he played fast. I think that someone like this is a strong player, such as with the move Kf1!, but they play a lot of their moves immediately. Meaning, when they think they can actually find an Expert move, but they are rated 1300 because they play so much fast chess/moves.

The game score is only accurate for 42 moves and after that it is wrong because I was down to 3 1/2 minutes. Won it with around 46 seconds left. He sacked his knight for the h-pawn, and luckily I had the right colored bishop to promote the a-pawn with. He offered my a draw 3 times, while it was even, and I told him “no”. I was down to 1 1/2 minutes, and I still did not accept the draw, particularly after last night. But there was no delay set on his clock! So I had to ditch the score-keeping at the end.

Round 2
I won against a nice gentleman whom I had never played before. This was my best game of the day, still I had issues. I went ahead with the combo without calculating everything correctly, which is a good thing because he spent a lot of his own time on it. I hadn’t figured out how I would get in Bh6 with the Qg6, whilst also holding onto the e-pawn. This is the thing, chess is not all calculation, if I knew WHAT to calculate (i.e., the ideas), then it would be easy to calculate it. Here, the answer is obvious once Fruit shows me. Queen check to h5 and hold the e5 pawn with the queen from there, then play in Bh6, and if he trades rooks and Bf8, then check the queen back down to g6 then play Rf7 wins. It’s these ideas that are hard to find. If one told you these ideas, you could calculate them. 😉

I smugly figured I had the win in the bag, but I misplayed the continuation. I thought that 26.Bc3 ices it (not the best move), but I had considered getting the rook involved instead. I was expecting 26..d4 (instead of his 26..Rf8??), 27.Bxd Qd7, 28.Bc3 then push e6 for mate. I noticed his Qc6 would mate one move too late as well. But, he has not 27..Qd7?, but 27..Bxg! This would have an unpleasant surprise, where White must respond with 28.Kg1, but it is still +- +2. (White will win a bishop under the right circumstances, then be up pawns)

The winning move is 26.Rc1, close to +7. Basically, the idea is to continuously slap Black’s queen silly with your rook, bishop, and or e6 pawn, which retains initiative in the attack. White may continue with Rc3 or Rf1, for example, depending.

Round 3
I lost against Life Master Brian Wall, whom I have never played before either.

There was no break between rounds 2 and 3. We finished our round 2 game with 26 minutes remaining, so that was all the break I got, so I went out and got a burrito and brought back a coffee. I was still tired, dazed and confused, and played against the Scotch timidly until my coffee kicked after a lost opening. At least now the intimidation factor is out of the way, and I wished I had played him long ago for that very reason.

I was completely unprepared for the Scotch Gambit and had lost confidence defending against it last time I played online, but didn’t brush up on that opening at all. I need to badly brush up on it, but I stopped playing it how I used to with ..Nf6 and ..d5, which I have had good results with online, but didn’t know if it was okay enough to play against a Master, I guess.

This is only like the second time I have played that ..d6 variation, and my head was spinning with the possibilities for White before it calmed down. Brian pointed out that if I played ..Qe7 because I were afraid of the e5 push, then I should wait until e5 is played before playing ..Qe7.

He didn’t commit his queen early like players do online, and in my tired state this got me seeing every ghost of a tactic that was possible, but was difficult to put it all back together again in my scattered mind. I wish I had sat down and studied this for Black seriously the way I do OTB. I need to have my openings for Black much more down pat than I do right now. It seems like eons since I have cracked open by MCO 13 openings encyclopedia, for example.

I missed the obvious defense to Qa4 (threatening mate on e8) of ..Qd6 followed by ..Qd7. Instead I played ..a6 so as to defend against it with ..b5 if needed. After I played it, I felt he would play 27.d6, winning, but I didn’t see his idea, follow-up of 28.Qc6.

So, two more rounds tomorrow. I keep getting paired against low-rated under-rated players, and tomorrow may be more of the same. I had fun, anyway. 🙂

I’ll post the games when I get a chance.

Day 2 – Disappointment

Round 4
I was 45 minutes late for the early round, but won against a 1400 player, Fantasy Variation of Caro-Kahn

Wow, I can’t believe that I miscalculated so badly in this game, my opponent made me look good. I got there tired, with burning eyes, so I kept my eyes closed at the beginning of the game and tried to rest or relax. I saw both 7.Bxf+ after I moved (had only considered the follow-up of Ng5 during the move), and 8.Bxf+(double-check).

So I was like, okay, I am awake now and have been messing up. So I looked at 9.Bxf7+ for a long time, and miscalculated it, so played Kh1 instead. I had no idea that I had time to play Kh1 AFTER I played Bxf7+. I was too worried about what was going on down at the b2 square (didn’t follow the threat trail back from b2 to g7 probably, which gains a tempo forcing ..Nf6. Plus if..Qb6, then Qb3 and queen and bishop mutually defend one another, plus double-attack the knight, if ..Qb6 is played before ..cxb2. It looks like one line, but it is very branchy and all branches look similar except for move-order, quite tricky to realize this at the board.

This is one of those games where I was calculating badly, I suppose, but my opponent didn’t make me prove it much, so I guess I simply gave him more of a positional lesson.

One thing I had got right was the question of 17..Ne5. I was planning to play 18.f4 and give up the minor exchange after ..Nc4. Fruit says that’s approx. +1.5. My knight will be at least as strong as his bishop, if not much more so. Plus, it doesn’t yield initiative as 18.b3 would.

Round 5
I used RollingPawns opening variation to win a pawn! I wanted to congratulate you right then and there RollingPawns! I didn’t even realize I could win a pawn, just remembered it’s what you played. I was looking at crazy bad stuff, as usual.

Early in the opening, I was going to play defense and try to hold onto the pawn, but then had this sort of moral dilemma. Should I go for a suspect attack to distract him from the kingside, or should I hunker down and defend. My instincts told me to defend, but I was thinking “What if I am a pawn up and only draw by defending?”. But I learned something. Against weaker players, attack, against stronger players, defend, always defend, there is no dichotomy. Defend by attacking or defense, but always defend. Don’t get lazy and only attack.

I thought of playing a more positional strategy, but figured someone would tell me I am being too defensive on this blog. Like, “I go backwards with my knight too much”, sounds like something ChessTiger or Aziridine might say. Screw that, that is how I win, with strategy, it just doesn’t look impressive because my opponent is 1300 typically.

I was thinking a pawn structure such as, for example the moves ..0-0, b6, Bc8, Bb7, Nc6b8,Nbd7, Rfd8, a5, and even h6 and Kh7. Perhaps then even c6 with d5 break is possible, or use the a-file for some trades. I should have employed a solid unassuming positional strategy. Instead, I figured I’d get initiative with a6 and b5, but that it was positionally bad to have my pawns on light squares. I got so carried away with this attack that I completely neglected kingside defense. However, if I were playing positional, I would have been in the mindset to look for the plan on defense. I just can’t believe I played like that. He played well, but that was not my game, nor very sensible.

BTW, I saw his RxBc6 before he played Rfc1, there was simply no way to hold onto a piece other than for hope-chess. I knew my last tactic there would probably lose, but the alternative was a sterile endgame. I should have played solid though because I never paused to remember that endgames are his weakness, not tactical situations. It’s hard to have presence of mind in these latter rounds, and I definitely did not have it, and I knew it!

27..Nxd5 was the “losing” move, but what was the alternative? There’s no way I could see to get those pieces unstuck, and that is why I knew it was probably bad going into it, looked like it may not work.

It’s harder not to simply lash out when tired. Yet my problem last night when tired was being too defensive. If I had simply drawn that game, I would have won $175 instead of merely earning back my $35 entry fee for the loss. $225 for the win.

It’s obvious looking back at this game that I never wanted to defend. Didn’t really even consider ..h6..g5, at least not ..g5, which is fine. I should have pushed back on the kingside, but I guess all of this strategic play was too much for me, overwhelmed me for a last round game. I’ll have to remember this. For once it’s not an analysis of all the checkmates that I should have found, it was all about defense. This was an older gentleman and he brought his “old school” game against me.

I played Kurt tonight, and was 0-3 record against him going into this game. I prepared, but he deviated with the O’Kelly variation.

This game, I was still tired from yesterday night’s game, so perhaps that contributed toward missed opportunities.

I knew that the purpose of the O’Kelly is to play ..e5 after my knight lands on d4, but I figured that ..a6 probably wouldn’t hurt him enough in the C3 Silician. After the game, I remembered Nunn saying that “c4 is probably the only way to get an advantage against the O’Kelly”, or something like that, but I never even considered the obvious 3.Nc3, transposing back into normal Open Sicilian channels.

I missed his ..d5, which is a cliched move for Black in the Sicilian, only thinking of ..d6, or I would have played Nf3 instead of Nf5.

I was looking to play f4, but completely missed 18.f4. Black can respond with 18..Ng4, but I thought I was simply losing the c5 pawn for anything reckless looking like that. Plus, I didn’t want a Bb7 hitting my g2 pawn.

At the end of the game, he offered a draw. I had 3 1/2 minutes and accepted the draw with 1:59 remaining on my clock, figuring that I wouldn’t have time to win a won position, but I didn’t see the right continuation anyway. I was going to play 40.Kd3, which can retain some complicated winning chances, if played correctly. But the reason he offered the draw is because he saw 40.Rd5!

This is one of those situations where if I could have spent those last two minutes to make a “40th move”, I probably find 40.Rd5 in the last few seconds, and then proceed to spend an hour, assuming, working on trying to win the endgame. But at G/90, this is where my fallacious use of time comes back to bite, in an endgame against a strong player.

Another thing is when you are blitzing with a few minutes left, and someone offers you a draw, it throws you off of your blitzing rhythm, and now you are forced to think it out beyond just the current move. I was confident, but once he offered the draw, I had to doubt my intentions to play on with so little time remaining. Still, I made the right choice even for having a complex winning position where I could nab a pawn. Just not enough time to play it accurately. He had around 17 minutes remaining, so the time-scramble wouldn’t have been mutual, although I am sure he could see how I was gaining on him on the clock with every move.

I finally figured out how Black could draw it a pawn down in the rook ending. Engine score is not overly helpful because you know it’s a draw when the engine is saying +2, but you are simply repeating moves with the engine, going nowhere. I found a lot of White wins before figuring out the Black draw. Of course, if I had overstepped the time, I still would have lost.

I couldn’t believe it, Alex, Isaac, Dean, and Jason each congratulated me on the draw separately. I didn’t realize that not losing to Kurt was such a feat, but it was a nice surprise that a draw could be so well regarded. This is why it’s nice to always play tough, because people will love you for playing the role of spoiler (to help their chances), even if you can’t get the job done for yourself.

Probably, if you took a snapshot of my current rating after this game, it is 1800 or 1801, something like that. But I am going to play that 5-round tournament this weekend where I have to “run the gauntlet” of weaker players, since I am usually in the top 1/4, ratings-wise, of a local Open tournament.

A move earlier, I had thought to play Nbd7 before ..e6, but I got over-confident when I saw Bd3, forgetting to watch the queen’s power for making consecutive moves.

I was planning on playing ..Bd6, should White take on b7 with the queen, but instead he was hoping that I would play ..b6, and allow Ne5-c6.

Tom spent a lot of time in ultimately not taking the b7 pawn, and what is more bizarre is that he was actually right not to take it!
9.Qxb7 Bd6, 10.Bg5 0-0, 11.Ne4? This was as far as I had seen, although I was wondering whether 11..Rb8, 12.Qxa Rxb2 was a good idea or not. I probably would have played that only because there is hardly another suitable plan on the board, but Black can win that c or a-pawn of White’s.

I should mention that on move 8..Nbd7, I missed a principle variation 8..Nc6, 9.Qxb7 and I thought to myself “I can’t take on d4, so why would I think to goad him with this?” But actually, there is 9..Nb4, which I missed. White plays 10.Qb5+, 11.Qe2 to defend against the knight fork at c2. Still, the ..Nbd7 move seems to turn out better for Black.

The problem with 8.Qb5 (yes, it probably is too tempting for the average class player to pass up) is that Black has immediately equalized. White’s queen is in the wrong sector of the board, and in a gambit that sort of detail matters.

I thought, perhaps a quick pawn push for White with 9.d5, but then after the trades on d5, Black has ..Bb4+ followed by Qe7+, and Black can 0-0-0 so as to not worry about a possible Re1 pin of queen against king, as shown by Fruit.

When he played 14.Rhf1, that is when I saw that things were going my way, working the pin against his Qe2.

After 15..f6, I felt I had everything under control, a solid pawn up, since 16.Ne3 BxB+, 17.NxB QxQ, 18.RxQ and White can get Ne6 in, but I had calculated that it goes nowhere, he is simply a pawn down.

White plays a crazy, yet interesting sac. I accepted it and was prepared to give up my rook for two minor pieces, which wouldn’t be a guaranteed win, but a big advantage. I played ..Qf7 to halt his initiative. I had planned on the game continuing with 19..RxB followed by 20.RxR Nxe, which would be a very interesting ending. Perhaps he had calculated on this, I figured (although he did play it quickly enough, for such an important sac).

He took so long on the recapture 19.dxe5, that by the time he moved I had already seen that the exchange sac wasn’t necessary. I was simply winning the pawn, and will be up a whole piece.

22..g5 was a rather impetuous/foolish quick move. 22..Nf6-h5 would be a sensible way to win the pawn, and if 23.Re5 to prevent it, then ..Ng4 forks rook and pawn.

Perhaps 25.b3 could have prevented a rook trade. I could see that after 25.Re7, that I could play ..Rf1+, ..Rf2+, then ..Re1+ forcing trade of one set of rooks. The rook-pair was his best chance.

Once he played 30.c4, that is when I breathed out that sigh of relief and whipped out 30..c5, which basically ices it. If he had followed it up after 31.a3 with 32.b4, then I was still going to follow it up with 32..Nd4, which Fruit approves of.

He made it colorful at the end. If he had played 38.Kd6, then I was going to continue with 38..a6, 39.Kc7 b5.

I kind of goofed off at the end for the fun of it, since I saw that I could let him have my knight, instead of 48..Kd4, which I knew would be more bleak for him and less colorful. Well, I could see that it was just winning his last pawn. I thought about sacking my knight for his pawn, but I knew that if Chesstiger ever stopped by, he would lambast me for it. I’d been studying king and pawn endgames this week.

I had 7 minutes left at the end of the game, and he basically took as much time as I did, so that one the one hand it was a nice long game, but OTH I had the luxury of not playing a blitzer who is still in H.S. He had 12 minutes at the end. Tom is an older gentleman.